Reproductive organization. Plants
bisexual, with bisexual spikelets; with hermaphrodite florets. The spikelets of
sexually distinct forms on the same plant; hermaphrodite (occasionally seemingly
all so, by suppression of the pedicelled members), or hermaphrodite and
male-only, or hermaphrodite and sterile. The male and female-fertile spikelets
mixed in the inflorescence. The spikelets overtly heteromorphic
(pedicellate awnless, sessile awned); all in heterogamous combinations.
Plants seemingly outbreeding, or inbreeding; seemingly chasmogamous (the racemes
usually long-peduncled and exserted from the spatheoles), or
exposed-cleistogamous (seemingly, in A. trepidaria, in which the reduced
raceme is enclosed in the spatheole, cf. Monium).

Inflorescence. Inflorescence
paniculate; open, or contracted; with capillary branchlets; spatheate (and
spatheolate); a complex of partial inflorescences and
intervening foliar organs. Spikelet-bearing axes
racemes (usually), or very much reduced (to one sessile spikelet
with one more or less vestigial partner, in A. trepidaria - cf.
Monium); the spikelet-bearing axeswith 23
spikelet-bearing articles, or with 45 spikelet-bearing
articles, or with only one spikelet-bearing article
(A. trepidaria); solitary; with very slender rachides;
disarticulating; disarticulating at the joints. Articles
linear; without a basal callus-knob; not appendaged; disarticulating
transversely to disarticulating obliquely (less obviously oblique than in
Monium); densely long-hairy, or somewhat hairy, or glabrous.
Spikelets solitary (sometimes, at least seemingly, in A.
trepidaria), or solitary and paired (the pedicelled members - including
their pedicels - often missing, vestigial or much reduced and concealed in the
callus hairs, at least in parts of the raceme); not secund; sessile and
pedicellate (but the pedicellate members not always conspicuous);
consistently in long-and-short combinations (probably usually, if
evidence of the pedicelled members is diligently sought), or not in distinct
long-and-short combinations (often ostensibly solitary, sometimes
genuinely so); when paired, in pedicellate/sessile combinations. Pedicels of
the pedicellate spikelets free of the rachis. The
shorter spikelets hermaphrodite. The longer spikelets
male-only, or sterile.

Female-sterile spikelets. The
pedicellate spikelets very variable in development and size, those of (e.g.)
A. pumila and A. leptocoma larger than their sessile partner;
awnless or the upper glume shortly awned. The lemmas awnless.

Glumes two; more or less equal; long relative to the adjacent lemmas;
hairy, or hairless; without conspicuous tufts or rows of hairs; awned
(G1 bidentate to bi-setaceous at tip, G2 more or less
long-awned); more or less carinate (G2), or non-carinate
(G1); very dissimilar (both hardened, the G1 dorsally
rounded or flattened, acuminate and slightly bicarinate towards the tip, the
G2 naviculate and keeled towards the tip, its slender awn sometimes
long and twisted around the more substantial one of the lemma). Lower
glumenot two-keeled (except towards the tip); convex on the back to
concave on the back; not pitted; relatively smooth; 5–7 nerved (sometimes
obscurely so, the median inconspicuous or absent). Upper glume 3 nerved.
Spikelets with incomplete florets. The incomplete florets proximal to the
female-fertile florets. Spikeletswith proximal incomplete
florets. The proximal incomplete florets 1; epaleate; sterile. The
proximal lemmas awnless (truncate to pointed); 0 nerved, or 2 nerved
(palea-like); more or less equalling the female-fertile lemmas to decidedly
exceeding the female-fertile lemmas; similar in texture to the female-fertile
lemmas (hyaline); not becoming indurated.

Transverse section of leaf blade, physiology.
C4; XyMS (but the presumed PCR sheath very thick
walled and mestome-sheath like in A. pumila and A. bigeniculata).
Mesophyll traversed by columns of colourless mesophyll cells (A.
leptocoma), or not traversed by colourless columns. Leaf blade
nodular in section. Midrib conspicuous; with one bundle only
to having a conventional arc of bundles (A. bigeniculata), or having a
conventional arc of bundles; with colourless mesophyll adaxially (this
represented by only a few cells in A. bigeniculata). The lamina
symmetrical on either side of the midrib. Bulliforms present in discrete,
regular adaxial groups (A. leptocoma), or not present in discrete,
regular adaxial groups; associated with colourless mesophyll cells to form
deeply-penetrating fans (these linked with the traversing colourless columns, in
A. leptocoma); associating with colourless mesophyll cells to form arches
over small vascular bundles (seemingly, e.g. in A. bigeniculata), or
nowhere involved in bulliform-plus-colourless mesophyll arches. Many of the
smallest vascular bundles unaccompanied by sclerenchyma, or all the vascular
bundles accompanied by sclerenchyma (A. leptocoma). Combined sclerenchyma
girders present; forming figures, or nowhere forming
figures. Sclerenchyma all associated with vascular bundles.

Paleotropical. African. Sudano-Angolan and West African Rainforest.
Sahelo-Sudanian and South Tropical African.

References, etc. Leaf anatomical:
this project.

Special comments. Contrast the
treatments of Jacques-Félix 1962 and Clayton 1966: an effective
resolution of generic limits (involving Anadelphia, Monium and
Pobeguinea) awaits acqisition and proper analysis of dependable
comparative data - meanwhile, the present descriptions are based on the
incomplete sample examined (see the accompanying file).

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